Gartmain at the head of Lochindall is a beach where most of the seaweed thrown up by the storms ends up. If you walk around the back gardens of old Bowmore there is deep black and very fertile loam, due much to the fertilising effects of well rotted seaweed. Not a place to sunbathe.

As I was headed back to Bowmore after my Sunday constitutional in Bridgend Woods I saw two friends loading seaweed for their compost heap. This was such a traditional sight I stopped for a while for a chat and to get some photographs. In the 19th century the harvesting of seaweed for potash for glass making kept much of the population of Islay with a marginal income. At that time the population was 10 times the 3,100 that it is now and this industry was the difference between viability and not. There is a good possibility that the decline in the population began with the chemical production of potash and the loss of the seaweed industry.

In the distance in the picture on the right you can see the old blacksmith’s cottage. At the turn of the century puffers of the Para Handy type were the workhorses of the west coast and here they would tie up for repair.

Sadly the blacksmith’s is derelict now but there is a rumour that Islay Estates are planning to renovate it as a museum to remember these days.

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